School of Canon Law

Diritto Canonico

The School of Canon Law strives to prepare canonists with a deep theoretical and practical knowledge of Church law, which helps them develop legal skills with pastoral sensibility, while meeting the practical demands of legal praxis among God's people.

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Teaching follows a systematic method. It attempts to integrate the many juridical institutions emerging from the study of the Church’s Law within the diverse branches of canonical science. All this, in conformity with the Church’s vision of herself as expressed in the Second Vatican Council.

The program’s realist perspective helps the student to appreciate the dimension of justice that belongs to the salvific goods of the Church even prior to their reception in positive law.  This metaphysical realism offers a much richer viewpoint than the old positivistic outlook, which still influences some currents of canonical thought.  Students learn to seek justice while exercising legal prudence in fidelity to sound ecclesiastical tradition.
The program integrates theoretical study with courses on legal praxis.

The School has a large number of permanent professors as well as many prestigious visiting professors from the Roman Curia and from all over the world.

The School’s research and teaching are enriched by the staff’s experience in various dicasteries of the Holy See and in the Tribunals of the Vicariate of Rome. Close links to and regular academic collaboration with colleagues from other universities of Rome and of other countries also enrich the School, along with the theological research and collaboration of the School of Theology.

 

Sezione: 

In evidenza

During the Assembly of the Conference of Rectors of Universities and Pontifical Roman Institutions (CRUIPRO) on November 20th, the inter-institutional agreement CRUIPRO to promote student mobility within the Roman ecclesiastical university system, which had been signed on December 7, 2020, was renewed for a second three-year term.

The agreement stipulates that every semester, regular students can attend a course free of charge at one of the participating institutions, subject to authorization from their home institution and acceptance by the hosting institution.

Access the Agreement | Executive Protocol

Friday, June 23, 2023 (at 11:30 a.m., in the Aula Magna), the university held the Welcome to... Alumni Santa Croce event for who have finished their studies this academic year.

Following the initial meeting in the Aula Magna, was celebrated a Mass in the Basilica of St. Apollinare, followed by a lunch in the courtyard.

Welcome to... Alumni Santa Croce

 

On Thursday, May 25, 2023, at Villa Bonaparte, headquarters of the French Embassy to the Holy See, the de Lubac Prize 2023 was presented to the winners.

The School of Canon Law of the Holy Cross and the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, together with the Angelicum Thomistic Institute, have organized an academic conference entitled The Concept of "Ius" in Thomas Aquinas. The event will take place on April 21 and 22, 2023.

This analysis takes into consideration the entirety of Aquinas' account of lex from the Prima Secundae of the Summa Theologiae, as this account is interrelated with his understanding of lex as a ratio of ius (from S. Th. II-II, q. 57, a. 1, ad 2).

The conference also aims to analyze the inherent connection between justice which has ius as its object—the legal aspect of iustitia—and broader issues of the divine-salvific and moral aspects of justice.

The university will host the first day of the conference on April 21, 2023 (9 a.m., Aula Magna Giovanni Paolo II).

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